Internet petition AGAINST Tridentine Mass is a big flop.

Fr. Farinella thinks traditionalists believe Pope Pius VI to be "inspired by the devil".

Translation provided by Fr. Zuhlsdorf here.

CITTA’ DEL VATICANO - The collection of signatures launched on the internet by the priest and biblical scholar from Genoa Fr. Paolo Farinella against the return of the Mass in Latin – object of a long discussed possible Motu Proprio of Benedict XVI - and in defense of the choices of Vatican II is not having the successed that was hoped for. The object of the appeal was to gather at least 10,000 signatures to send to the Vatican, but over the almost two months since the launch the number of signers is just above one thousand.

There are just 1052 signers up to today, who have joined the first signer, namely the same Fr. Farinella, but it is necessary to count also the signatures which are clearly false, such as that of someone who mocking signed as none less than "Marcel Lefebvre, Archbishop of Dakar", ....

"The problem is not that the Mass is in Latin (today an anachronism)" he explained in his online appeal. "The true problem rests in the fact that the Mass of Pius is a banner raised by the traditionalists to bring about the complete abnegation of the ecumenical Council Vatican II and especially of Pope Paul VI, whom they consider schismatic and inspired by the devil." Thus, in reviving for them the old rite, "you make yourself an accomplice and supporter of an even greater schism because the disciples of Lefebvre don’t accept the authority of the Council". "You are the Pope and we recognize your authority in this matter," Fr. Farinella added. "But at the same time we say to you that you cannot do this thing you desire and you cannot contradict a council much less abrogate it as you are doing with the concession of exclusive use the Mass of Pius V."

Polish Intellectuals sign Tridentine Manifesto!

We are with you, Holy Father!

Declaration on the use of the Traditional Liturgy

In light of ever more frequent statements of close associates of the Holy Father, who confirm his intention of restoring the right and freedom of use of the traditional liturgy in the Latin rite, as faithful laymen of the Roman Catholic Church we wish to express our hope and gratitude.

We would also like to affirm our solidarity with the Pope, mindful that for many years prior to taking up his seat as the Apostolic Successor of Saint Peter, he took up efforts to ensure that reverent liturgical forms passed on in a long tradition and confirmed officially by Saint Pius [V] "according to the rites and customs of the Roman Church" (Apostolic Constitution Quo Primum, Pope St. Pius V, July 14th 1570) were preserved so as to "hand on this treasure for the Church of today and tomorrow" (Cardinal Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, addressing liturgical conference, held over 22 to 24 July 2001, convened under the patronage of the Abbey of Fontgombault).

We understand the expected promotion of the traditional liturgy, otherwise termed the classical Roman rite, to involve the affirmation of the principle which is mentioned in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, ratified by the Servant of God Pope John Paul II, which quotes the words of the Second Vatican Council: "that Holy Mother Church holds all lawfully recognized rites to be of equal right and dignity, and that she wishes to preserve them in the future and to foster them in every way." (CCC, 1203; Sacrosanctum Concilium, 4). The then-Cardinal Ratzinger also reminded us of this principle, stating that "the Council ordered a reform of the liturgical books, but it did not prohibit the former books." (Ten Years of the Motu Proprio Ecclesia Dei, by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger).

Everything indicates that today we are progressing towards solutions which will bring these words into full daylight.

3. We dearly thank the Holy Father for all his gestures of understanding, openness, and respect regarding "the feelings of all those who are attached to the Latin liturgical tradition".

These gestures underscore and continue the line of action of John Paul II, who appealed to the Bishops and those exercising a pastoral ministry in the Church twenty years ago for "measures to guarantee respect for [the] rightful aspirations" expressed by "all those Catholic faithful who feel attached to some previous liturgical and disciplinary forms of the Latin tradition" (John Paul II, motu proprio Ecclesia Dei, 5 c).

Mindful of all the difficulties and cares which are associated with the service of the shepherds of the Church, we expect that the regulations annouced by the Holy See will also serve to break the specific order of intolerance, which hinders the crucial internal unity in the Church. (See: Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, God and the World).

4. Moreover, we hope that the response to this endeavor by Benedict XVI in the current discourse within the Church will include "every effort to avoid expressions, judgments and actions which do not represent with truth and fairness" the condition of those Catholics who are tied to the traditional liturgy (Vatican Council II, Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis Redintegratio, 4).

We also hope that the granting of full rights of the use of the liturgy of Saint Pius V will improve the prospects of healing the rift which also took place in this context in 1988 and which lasts until this day, and for which, perhaps, "men of both sides were to blame" (Vatican Council II, Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis Redintegratio, 3), partly due to the marginalization, within the Church, of "certain truths and certain values of the Christian faith" which "are no longer lived and loved" (Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Speaking as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, addressing the National Conference of Chilean Bishops in Santiago). Let us pray that this wound be healed and that all Catholics who are already united by faith in the same dogmas will henceforth be able to enjoy the visible communion of the life of the Church.

5. In these days of expectation we therefore wish to join those voices of support and gratitude, which are already being directed toward the Holy Father by public figures in the Christian community, and we willingly hereby declare our support and gratitude to the Holy Father Benedict XVI for his will to remove the practical discrimination of the traditional liturgy, which has served throughout the ages as a worthy instrument for the sanctification of many and as a great monument of our spiritual culture.

Przemysław Alexandrowicz, senator

Prof. Jacek Bartyzel, political scientist

Dr Sławomir Cenckiewicz, historian

Prof. Jan Dzięgielewski, historian

Marcin Gugulski, journalist

Lech Jęczmyk, translator

Marek Jurek, Marshall of the Sejm (Speaker of the Parliament)

Bogusław Kiernicki, president of the Fundacja Św. Benedykta (St. Benedict Foundation)

Wojciech Kilar, composer

Aleksander Kopiński, historian and literary critic, editor of "Fronda"

Dr Jacek Kowalski, art historian, singer

Prof. Grzegorz Kucharczyk, historian

Jan Filip Libicki, MP (Member of Parliament)

Marcin Libicki, MEP (Member of the European Parliament)

Paweł Lisicki, writer

Prof. Roman Michałowski, historian

Andrzej Mikosz, lawyer

Dr Paweł Milcarek, philosopher and journalist, editor in chief of "Christianitas"

Paweł Nowacki, deputy director of TVP1, author of documentaries

Dr Justyn Piskorski, university teacher

Ewa Polak-Pałkiewicz, journalist

Tomasz Raczkiewicz, artist of the Poznan Opera

Prof. Marcin Sompoliński, conductor, Akademia Muzyczna in Poznan

Dr Piotr Sosiński, lawyer

Konrad Szymański, MEP

Prof. Kazimierz Świrydowicz, mathematician

Dr Tomasz P. Terlikowski, philosopher, journalist at Polskapresse

Jacek Tomczak, MP

Prof. Piotr Tryjanowski, biologist

Artur Zawisza, MP

Italian intellectuals sign "Tridentine Manifesto"

Rorate Caeli has posted the amazing news that a group of Italian intellectuals have signed a Manifesto in support of Pope Benedict XVI's decision to free the Tridentine Mass.

A group of French intellectuals has also signed their own version of the Manifesto.

The underground is coming out in force.

I believe this is going to be the first salvo in the battle for the return to Tradition in the modern Church.


The Italian daily Il Foglio publishes today a manifesto signed by great Italian intellectuals, including Antonio Socci and Franco Zeffirelli (and also René Girard, of the Académie Française, who published with other French intellectuals a manifesto published today at Le Figaro,), in defense of the liberation of the Traditional Roman Mass, the Missa Piana, and remembering the Petition of 1966 and the great British Petition of 1971, of venerable memory.

Our English version of the "Socci Manifesto" (from the Italian original):

I wish to launch an appeal to the world of culture.

In support of a decision of Benedict XVI.

The announcement was given by Cardinal Arturo Medina Estevez, a member of the Ecclesia Dei commission which met to discuss the liberalization of the Latin Mass. The prelate said, "The publication of the Motu Proprio by the Pope which will liberalize the celebration of the Latin Mass according to the Missal of Saint Pius V is close." It is an extraordinarily important event for the Church and even for the culture and history of our civilization. Historically, lay intellectuals were actually those to realize more and better the disaster, the actual cultural destruction, represented by the "prohibition" of the liturgy of Saint Pius V and the disappearance of Latin as sacred language of the Catholic Church.

When, 40 years ago -- in contravention to the documents of the Council -- the prohibition of the ancient liturgy of the Church (that which had been celebrated even during the Council) was imposed, there was a great and meritorious protest by very important intellectuals who considered this decision as an attack on the roots of our Christian Civilization (the liturgy has always been a center and a fountain of the most sublime art). Two appeals were published in defense of the Mass of Saint Pius V, in 1966 and 1971. These are some of the names which undersigned them: Jorge Luís Borges, Giorgio De Chirico, Elena Croce, W. H. Auden, the directors Bresson and Dreyer, Augusto Del Noce, Julien Green, Jacques Maritain (who indeed was the favorite intellectual of Paul VI, the one to whom the Pope had given the letter to intellectuals at the end of the Council), Eugenio Montale, Cristina Campo, François Mauriac, Salvatore Quasimodo, Evelyn Waugh, Maria Zambrano, Elémire Zolla, Gabriel Marcel, Salvador De Madariaga, Gianfranco Contini, Giacomo Devoto, Giovanni Macchia, Massimo Pallottino, Ettore Paratore, Giorgio Bassani, Mario Luzi, Guido Piovene, Andrés Segovia, Harold Acton, Agatha Christie, Graham Greene, and many others, incuding the editor of the “Times”, William Rees-Mogg.

They are largely lay intellectuals because the cultural and spiritual value of the ancient Latin liturgy is a legacy of all, as is the Sistine Chapel, as is the Gregorian [chant], as the great cathedrals, Gothic sculpture, the Basilica of Saint Peter also are. Even more so today, when our entire European Civilization risks to cut off and deny its own roots.

Curiously, even "progressive Catholics", which made the dialogue with the world and with modern culture their banner, did not give any regard and fought for forty years to keep this incredible prohibition. An unprecedented arbitrariness. In April 2005, at the eve of the election of Benedict XVI, it was a lay writer, Guido Ceronetti, who writes, in La Repubblica, an open letter to the new Pope, in which he asked "that the sinister suffocating gag on the Latin voice of the Mass be removed". When he was a cardinal, Ratzinger declared that the prohibition of the Mass of Saint Pius V was unprecedented: "throughout her history, has never abolished nor forbidden orthodox liturgical forms, which would be quite alien to the very spirit of the Church". In one of his books, he retold dramatically how he had viewed the publication of the missal of Paul VI: "I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy. The impression was even given that what was happening was quite normal," but, Ratzinger wrote, "the prohibition of the missal that was now decreed, a missal that had known continuous growth over the centuries, starting with the sacramentaries of the ancient Church, introduced a breach into the history of the liturgy whose consequences could only be tragic ... the old building was demolished, and another was built."

The effects were disastrous. The road to incredible abuses in the liturgy was opened. Ratzinger writes, "I am convinced that the crisis in the Church that we are experiencing today is to a large extent due to the disintegration of the liturgy, which at times has even come to be conceived of etsi Deus non daretur: in that it is a matter of indifference whether or not God exists and whether or not He speaks to us and hears us. But when the community of faith, the world-wide unity of the Church and her history, and the mystery of the living Christ are no longer visible in the liturgy, where else, then, is the Church to become visible in her spiritual essence?"

That same Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, who prepares to cancel the prohibition, will find opposition even inside the Church (already pre-announced by the French bishops) and he deserves an answer from the world of culture which, forty years ago, made its voice heard. I ask intellectuals and whomever may wish to do so to sign this synthetic manifesto:

"We express our praise for the decision of Benedict XVI to cancel the prohibition of the ancient Mass in Latin according to the Missal of Saint Pius V, a great legacy of our culture, which must be saved and rediscovered."

Ecclesia Dei Plenary meeting news:

From a news dispatch by the Italian news agency ANSA December 12th, 2006:

"The publication of the Motu Proprio from the Pope which will liberalize the celebration of the Latin Mass according to the Missal of Saint Pius V is close." Who affirmed this was Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estevez, member of the Ecclesia Dei Commission, which met this morning to discuss the liberalization of the Mass in Latin. "We studied the document with tranquility," the Cardinal affirmed. "We discussed [it] together for over 4 hours and to make some corrections to the text of the Motu Proprio." The next step belongs to Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos (president of the commission), who will present the text to Benedict XVI. There shall perhaps be another meeting of the Ecclesia Dei Commission, Medina added. Another member of the [Commission], the Cardinal of Lyon [sic -> Bordeaux], Jean Pierre [sic] Ricard, did not wish to make any comment, underlining that "[he] is bound by the pontifical secret".

ECCLESIA DEI COMMISION MEETING DECEMBER 12

Latest news just in from Rorate Caeli:
Ecclesia Dei meeting tomorrow to discuss liberalization
From La Repubblica:

Benedict XVI shortens the timing for a reconciliation with the followers of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre

The "Ecclesia Dei" Commission, established for this purpose by John Paul II, will meet tomorrow in a first plenary session to discuss the question of the liberalization of the Mass in Latin.

The meeting of December 12 is reported by the French news agency I.Media and will include the presence of Cardinal Ricard, a member of the Commission and president of the French Episcopal Conference.


More details soon...